Recent reviews by Mouseman

Vanripper does it again! A free game with a cute story, gorgeous art, and a simple gameplay loop with a great difficulty curve. Mittsies soundtrack is also great here again, as it was in Helltaker.

My only criticism is that controller support can be improved. I noticed some missed inputs on a PS5 controller, but still the game was quite playable.

Normal mode can be completed in a single sitting (~1.5 hours), while hard mode will likely take more time and attempts to complete.

While I am not normally a visual novel person, I did keep an eye on this game after seeing a trailer for it during a /V/GA a few years ago. The concept seemed silly, but also seemed like one with a bit of wholesome content in it.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that the game takes itself quite seriously; putting together a good cast of characters that you care about, great writing + jokes/references, and multiple endings that encourage choices to be made to balance the needs of the protagonist and the needs of Olivia. While the “best” ending may require a second playthrough, getting a “good” ending is quite feasible unless the player is purposely trying for a worse one. I have heard that ending 1 causes a bit of psychic damage, so I will likely just stick with endings 3 and 4 for myself. One playthrough of the game took about 12 hours, with the first 2/3s of the game having the more ending-impacting choices, while the final 1/3rd being just going along with the ride to see the ending you obtained.

Overall: Unless someone really dislikes visual novels, I’d recommend trying this game out. I’m looking forward to seeing what this team does next after seeing the quality of the story they put together here.

Very charming for a free April Fool's game. Recommended for any Sonic Universe fan.

For fans of the Wario Land series (in particular, 4 and Shake It!), this game both recaptures the formula of the older games well, as well as innovates in key places to make it more fun for a new audience.

Like Wario Land, the goal is to explore on the way into a level, and then race back to the start of the level on the way out. Secrets and collectibles are present, as well as Peppino's invulnerability in non-boss levels, making enemies more harmful for your time/score than they are for your health. The best innovation on this formula is to allow high speed dashing at any time (compared to Shake It's set points to begin dashing). This allows for both required momentum checks throughout the level, as well as speedrunning optimizations on the best way to beat the clock and rack up points.

The art I'm sure will be hit or miss for some, but I appreciate this unique take and the references made with the visuals.

Overall, I'd recommend it for anyone looking for a 2D-platformer, even those that have not played the series inspiring it.

One of the best board games ever made.

Defect Process strikes a very good balance of challenge, while remaining fair to the player. Enemy attacks and status effects are well telegraphed, the different attack patterns are designated by the unique design of each enemy type, and you are offered a choice of several movement based abilities at the start (and in the middle of) every run.

Speaking of abilities, the weapon types you select are very distinct from each other, offering an optional amount of depth for the player to explore. While one can just quickly spam attack with the starting two weapons, as the run continues more challenging enemy types will demand the player to utilize the special attacks of each weapon, which are executed via directional inputs, delayed attack commands, and double taps/quarter circles. The unlockable weapon offers even more complexity, but every weapon rewards those that want to find optimal combos themselves (as the game only details the basic commands for each attack). I have played on both keyboard and controller, and I definitely recommend a controller to make these inputs feel more natural.

Each run through the game is also very well paced, with combat sessions being broken up by mini-games and movement-based challenges to earn extra currency for that run. Each run then earns a secondary (permanent) currency that can be used to unlock music, weapons, or even more movement based abilities to be used in future runs. This is a great system to have the player come back for more to earn enough currency to shake up a future run of the game. Even after beating the boss of the run, I can see myself coming back every now and then to try a brand new weapon type, or a new combination of melee/ranged/movement skills.

The only thing missing for me in this game is lore to explain what is going on, but I respect that it may be an artistic choice to leave everything unknown to the player. With the level of detail put into the enemy designs and backgrounds though, it does leave me wanting more details about this tech-based world that the developer has built.

Great animations, and as a fighting game newbie it was not too difficult to pick up a character after some practice. It took a few matches to calibrate where I was ranked to find opponents my level, but after that have had a good experience.

Without a doubt, the best collect-a-thon I have played that was not on a Nintendo console. Solid platforming, filled with charm, and extras to keep you busy for a while.

A great deckbuilding game that continues to get new updates regularly